Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[hack]

I think that within ISIS there are both rational people and irrational. I think the rational ones are all the top of the structure. They aren't the ones martying themselves. They are grabbing power and valuable assets and even concubines in this case for chrissakes, and they are recruiting others to do the dying. Ethics may be another matter but that's some pretty damn rational behavior in an environment where there is no effective central authority.

IMO I think one mistake often made is to assume people are ideologically charged in that part of the world. I think the truth is that you can very easily fire people up with some rhetoric, but getting their vote or having them joint means addressing their problems, in a very small-scale pay-to-play way. In places where there are elections, the one who gets the vote is the last one to have handed out a little something on election day. With Erdogan it's coal. On election days they've distributed free coal, for people's stoves, across the hinterlands. Our politicians buy TV time, over there it's patronage that keeps you in power. People expect the guy at the top to grab it all for himself. And then they expect him to dole out a little bit to everyone else. So if you take away ISIS' money, they cannot disperse it.

[hack]

Jon:

To be clear, I was using liberalism as a reference to western ideals, not Liberals (capital L). But as a counterpoint to your opening, Liberals seem to think that wars are not fought with guns and men willing to use them. I'm quite sure "might doesn't make right" but it does make power. And when it comes down to who has the power, I'm pretty good with it resting in the hands of those who practice Western liberalism and all the good things about it. I very much prefer it to the alternative.

As for the rest of your post, I'm in favor of doing whatever it takes to destroy Medieval Islam.

I think it's a matter of the ability to execute the policy. Are you just gonna do it clean? Or will there be secondary goals established that have something to do with defense contracting and entrenched interests? If you can do it clean, then you've maybe got a better chance. Even then, fighting a smart war is difficult. We're now in Year 14 fighting wars in which there has been a constant stream of dumb stuff done. Sometimes on the advice of Washington's eggheads and sometimes contrary to it, but what you are talking about comes with an extremely high degree of difficulty and recent performance is highly discouraging.

[iam416]

Fair points. I'm not sure how it's to be executed. I'm really not. That's not my area of expertise (and that line presumes I have one, which is untrue).

I tend to think that fighting them over there makes sense. I'm not sure of the level of commitment needed to do that with real effect. I don't think eradication is a realistic goal, but weakening is, as is exhaustion of resources that reduces ability to strike beyond the region.

[hack]

It's not mine either. I've just read about enough head-scratcher decisions over the years to have little confidence in the process. If you're wondering, my areas of expertise include spotting and outing closeted Michigan fans and backgammon.

Agreed that, at the very least, weaken them to the point where they cannot project power outside their region. Contain all this in a spot, and then don't go there.

[Jeff Buchanan]

The ISIS planners and thinkers, the leadership, don't want to die, they want their foot soldiers to die.

Take away the leadership and the foot soldiers will not fight. I have never bought the rational that you take one and others will step up. It takes intelligence to operate an organization that wishes the establishment of a Caliphate. It is no coincidence that Binladen and al-Zawahiri, the original principles within Quaida came from prosperous families and were both highly educated (B was an engineer and A was a Surgeon).

Like Quaida, "ISIS" (I'm officially dropping the ISIL BS and hope Obama does too) is run by well educated men. Baghdadi is at the top the chain of command and this term is entirely relevant as that is exactly how ISIS operates - like a typical military. Why is that? Because almost all of ISIS/Baghdadi principles are former Sunni, Iraqi military who served Saddam. All of these men are again, highly educated. The former Iraqi Military men bring strategic, tactical and logistical training to ISIS that they learned in US Military schools most of them graduated from.

The Alliance - and I'll start calling it that because the Western powers are at war with ISIS whether or not they want to admit it - have the capacity to find and kill their leadership. I don't think it takes much of an imagination to recognize they do in light of the swift military action that is rounding up terrorists in France and Belgium. Hollande correctly declared a state of emergency in France and asked for more powers to search and seize and got them. US clandestine operations have been effective to date using drones as stand-off killing machines. It can be done ..... in Iran, Egypt, Lybia, Saudi, Syria and Lebanon ..... where these bastards find refuge and protection. The intelligence is already there and will get better as ISIS captives, the foot soldiers and the leadership, start talking when taken alive.

None of these governments are sufficiently strong to punish Western efforts to go in and clean out infested neighborhoods using short duration, unconventional Special Forces operations no matter how outraged those governments might be. The West collectively has the equipment and training to do that. Use it.

Concurrently, you strangle them financially. It may not be easy but any effort that decreases their access to funding of their operations is worth it. Start with the oil fields they have access to and destroy every oil rig that's out there. You can rebuild these with a massive Marshall Plan after the fact. The rigs are the targets because ISIL is not selling refined oil, their selling black crude to small truckers who transport it where it is then refined in thousands of small refineries throughout the ME and sold on the black market. They're also funding their operations by collecting taxes from populations they control. Liberate them and here's where the Kurds come in..... and Fuck Erdogan/Turkey. He is no ally and I'd consider his government unfriendly. Time for a change there which could be brought about by supporting and arming the Kurds, not directly against him but he'll fall with un-restricted Kurdish operations directed at ISIS.

Next, isolate and pressure the Saudis and Quatar. There's adequate evidence that these Sunni Oligarchies are aiding and abetting ISIS. Finally let the Russians do what they like in Syria. Frankly, I think ISIS wants boots on the ground in Syria to allow fulfillment of the prophecies in the Koran where the Islamic Caliphate defeats Roman Christendom.

The last thing I would want as a US Operational Commander is to fight alongside the Russians. Keep them at arms length but give them plenty of support. Sure, send another Division. There is no question Russia has the military technology to smash whatever the ill equipped ISIS might have grabbed from Syria and Iraq. While there's quantity, there is not a lot of quality. Let Russia challenge ISIS in the traditional military sense the ISIS leadership seems to want. They will crush them for the reasons already mentioned here.

[iam416]

Another angle that will need to be addressed is Europe's massively progressive "multiculturalist" efforts that have created nearly untouchable, un-assimiliated muslim enclaves in a number of European cities.

No one in France is at all surprised that the SOB that was "masterminded" the attack was "hiding" in Saint-Denis for several days. No one.

Dearborn, I think, may have the highest muslim population per capita in the US -- as far as I can tell, good people largely assimilated to US culture.

Saint-Denis may have upwards of 600,000 muslims, the majority of whom advocate sharia law. These are the folks who, while they may not be radical insofar as they'll cut your head off, they do approve of the people who do the beheading.

That's sort of a problem.

[hack]

Overall IMO I think you start with having an actual clean policy. It makes no sense to rattle sabres about Iran whilst Saudi is funding all this hate and violence. Because of this everybody knows we're not serious and shouldn't be taken at face value.

[hack]

Another angle that will need to be addressed is Europe's massively progressive "multiculturalist" efforts that have created nearly untouchable, un-assimiliated muslim enclaves in a number of European cities.

No one in France is at all surprised that the SOB that was "masterminded" the attack was "hiding" in Saint-Denis for several days. No one.

Dearborn, I think, may have the highest muslim population per capita in the US -- as far as I can tell, good people largely assimilated to US culture.

Saint-Denis may have upwards of 600,000 muslims, the majority of whom advocate sharia law. These are the folks who, while they may not be radical insofar as they'll cut your head off, they do approve of the people who do the beheading.

That's sort of a problem.

Pat yourselves, on the back, Americans. Despite all the problems we have treating Muslims like normal people, the vast majority of them who come here still do manage the normal life they want to have, and as full participants including citizenship after time. America is still a nation of immigrants and a just society in comparison.

[iam416]

Yeah, I'm far more comfortable with the US being the superpower than anyone else. Warts and all.

I also think that by and large American problems with Muslims are in the abstract -- when they interact with Muslims as part of American society it's fine (obviously, outliers and such). When Americans react to mass murders committed by fucks overseas, they generalize -- overgeneralize.

If I were being snarky then I'd say I'd rather be a Muslim in the US than an American in the Middle East. But that misses the point because it's relative. To paraphrase Mike Tomlin, "Our standard is our standard." We don't measure ourselves against Third World hellholes; we measure ourselves against our own standards.

[hack]

Beacon on the hill.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Overall IMO I think you start with having an actual clean policy. It makes no sense to rattle sabres about Iran whilst Saudi is funding all this hate and violence. Because of this everybody knows we're not serious and shouldn't be taken at face value.

I certainly get this.

Can you put this generalization into Foreign Policy steps that might establish them as clean?

I think this is the hard part. It's easy for me to talk tough but right now the iron is hot. From the standpoint of rallying Western powers to take meaningful steps, not necessarily as I might advocate and as above, the timing seems to be about perfect. It's not the drive into Paris by the Nazi's waving their flag or Pearl Harbor but it's close.

[hack]

It's time to end that alliance. They are down and should be kicked. I don't think they will stop funding Wahhabi hate. The basic social compact in that country is that in exchange for legitimacy as rulers the House of Saud enables and funds them. So it's time to demand they stop funding the hatred. When they refuse, stop selling them arms, start tracking the money, and then freeze assets and isolate banks. Ratchet that up to the financial system as a whole, like what was just done to Iran. Meantime, it is the planet's least-just society, and there's just tons of rhetorical ways pols can beat up on them and make it appear virtuous. The public-policy campaign is pretty simple.

No doubt, this is very difficult. We'd be screwing over entrenched interests at home and plunging into a brave new era of foreign policy in the region. But that has to happen from time to time.

[Da Geezer]

People always throw out the 'anti-semitism' card every time you're not 100% fully supportive of everything Israel does.

And folks use Islamophobe in the same way. The difference is that the Jews want to live, and the Islamists want to die. I think being afraid of anyone who, as a matter of religion, seeks death, is at least legitimate. Of course, "legitimate" and "rationale" are the words our Secretary of State used to describe the terrorists who attacked the Charlie Hebno offices in January.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Hack, so, you see the central foreign policy action in the fight against ISIS to be isolating the Saudis. Is that it? A start? What else?

I'm for ramping up military action both for its strategic and tactical benefit but, unlike Jon, I support Special Operations and targeted killing. At this point, I don't care much about collateral damage so, these kinds of operations become easier to conduct under those circumstances. I'm not sure the US would undertake operations where that is a problem though, so, there is that constraint.

You and I agree on the power of developing a financial strangle hold but the more I read about this, the harder it gets where ISIS is concerned. They seem to have a remarkably well developed and financed underground logistics chain. They may not really need the banking industry to move money. It seems they are hiding millions under mattresses. You have to take the mattresses out I'm thinking.

[hack]

The difference is that the Jews want to live, and the Islamists want to die.


Gross generalization. Reality is not such a neat and easy-to-judge dichotomy.

As a Jew I am horrified at the difference between the Israel and the Zionism I grew up with and studied in college, and what it's become now. It's a profoundly different place. The biggest change has been demographics. Religious people are having more babies than secular.